party all the time

We asked for a lot of favors to make our wedding happen. One was of my groom's parents to host our engagement party at their home. They have a huge basement perfect for entertaining, and they're the kind of people that own their own folding chairs and big tubs to put beers in and stuff like that. They kindly agreed.

there are absolutely no good pictures of our party, most likely because of all the sangria...

We had the party early - we were engaged at the end of December, our wedding was going to be in July, and we had our party in February. In the interest of full disclosure, the main reason for this was that we were broke and hoping to get gifts at the party so we could book our honeymoon. And it totally worked!

Here's the secret - Traveler's Joy. David and I had lived alone for years before moving in to our house together, so we already had basically everything we needed. Toasters and towels and monogrammed plungers were completely unnecessary, and so on our invites we stated that gifts were not needed but if people did feel the need they could contribute to our honeymoon experience via our Traveler's Joy registry.

This website is perfect, because let's be real here, all anybody wants to get when they get married (or ever) is money, but it's totally tacky to put that on the invitation (in lieu of blenders, please give us checks). On Traveler's Joy you register for things like airfare and hotel accommodations and excursions like snorkeling and horseback riding, and your guests click on it and pay that amount so they feel like they are actually giving you a "thing" instead of just money. Well, the joke is on them because the website just gives you the money! You can do whatever you want with it! You could use it for the actual thing that they think you're going to use it for, you can pay for other stuff for your wedding, or you can buy a bunch of hookers and have a coke party. NOBODY WILL KNOW THE DIFFERENCE!!

We were able to book our honeymoon right after our party, thanks to the generosity of our guests. So the moral of this story is to have your engagement party and/or shower at someone's house if at all possible (this was especially important to us since we only had a best man and maid of honor and not the traditional dozen bridesmaids who split the cost of the shower), and maybe you will luck out like we did and not have to pay even a cent. And register on Traveler's Joy. And also at your party, it's probably not a good idea to get into a huge fight with your future in-laws that ends with you crying and storming out. No matter what happened, that's not very gracious of you, and you probably had too much sangria to think clearly anyway. Definitely don't do that. Uh, I've been told. From other people who that happened to. Not me.